We have a Sorcerer, who while still doing all the good caster battle-field control, also throws out +2 damage per die CL 18 empowered intensified fireballs.

We have an Aldori Swordlord/Monk, who has an AC in the mid 30s (when he's not doing his fight defensively at no penalty for extra AC), and the ability to negate one attack on himself per round, combined with crazy good saves.

We have a rogue, who has an unbeatable stealth check(+38 I think it is?), and generally does about 150-ish damage when he gets the jump on his foe. Which is every single fight.

The other two players spend all their time buffing, healing, and condition removal, but are otherwise harmless and easy targets. One's a healing/crappy spell/reduntant and sub-par rapier Godling, the other is a healing/crappy archetype bard who is about as deadly as a commoner offensively.

So, I'm trying to prep an adventure by tomorrow, and I'm running into difficulties finding level appropriate challenges in a hurry, that can survive a single round against our characters, without completely negating their attacks.

Any suggestions? Wouldn't mind shelling out some cash if there's a highly recommended module you think might work.

Well, there are many ways of making somethign fairly easy turn into somethign every hard, for the sorcerer fire is the most common resistant form of energy, so get some creature that is immune or resistant to fire, the rogue could meet some creates with blindsight making sneak pretty useless(from what I understand) unless flanking or find somethign that is immune to sneak attack, I have not dealt with a lot of monks so I can't really give you much help on that, But i know I almost wiped one of my groups with some dark creepers/slayers, that see in darkness even if they have darkvision will get you, terrain and lighting is a great way to make things a little more difficult, these are just some of my ideas I hope this helps.

Yeah.. The players are new, so, while they are each very, very good at their niches, they have very obvious weaknesses. What I want is something that can challenge their specialties without making them useless, as the other two players would be helpless to assist.

For example, if I wanted to kill the party without them being able to do anything about it, it would be very easy to do, with just a Succubus. The rogue has a will save of +3, for example.

The problem is that I'm having difficulty finding anything that can survive the party without completely negating its powers.

Ahh yeah taking their specialty head on is hard to do, you will either have to just crush them at their own game or make them pay for specializing so much. That is a tough one, what race are they and what is thier plans when ever they get into a fight? do they just blast with their most powerful spells all at once? It is hard when there are a couple of under powerful guys that just sit back and are more of a liability then adding to the combat power of the group. Im sure you could have oh i dont know say have someone mind control the rogue and just see what they do let them have an easy out but just put the fear of dieing at their buddies hands into them.... That is usually pretty fun.

CR 14 Adult Red Dragon. Should be an adequate challenge for any 11-12th level party, particularly one that relies heavily on fire damage. The one straight out of the bestiary should do fine.

I find it very difficult that the rogue is able to reliably hit ACs north of 25 with all of his attacks (which is how I assume he's able to churn out 150+ damage). If the dragon takes to the skies, it should make full attacking even more difficult.

Frightful Presence should hurt the low will save people as well, in addition to the at-will pyrotechnics (look up the spell, particularly the blinding part). Make sure the battlefield is littered with eligible fire sources (or at least things the dragon could ignite with his breath weapon to BECOME eligible sources).

The dragon's to-hit bonus is sufficient to even threaten the crazy-AC monk, and the damage output is considerable. Who doesn't love a good dragon fight?

If you're worried that that fight might be TOO powerful, consider using a pair of the CR 10 Young red dragons instead. The overall CR of the encounter would be 2 lower (CR 12 total), no frightful presence, fewer spells, and half the breath weapon damage. Also, they have almost no chance of spotting your +38 stealth rogue (while the CR 14 at least has a remote chance). The other issue, of course, is that the CR 10s probably won't be able to touch the AC 34+ monk. Personally I'd favor the CR 14.

Also, they have almost no chance of spotting your +38 stealth rogue (while the CR 14 at least has a remote chance).

All dragons have 60' blindsense. If the rogue is withing 60' of the dragon, and has anything less then total cover (concealment would be useless), the dragon or dragons know exactly which square the rogue is in. (Blindsense needs line of effect to work.) They would still have the 50% miss chance if the dragon couldn't see the rogue, but the dragon would know the rogue was there.

Their breath weapon wouldn't care about the miss chance (no attack roll). IT might do no damage to the rogue himself (Evasion), but it could remove whatever the rogue is hiding behind.

Also, make the area smokey. Red dragons of very young (CR 10) or higher can see perfectly well in smokey conditions. For everyone else, the smoke would create concealment, meaning you can't sneak attack.

The rogue usually would get a surprise round and get a hit off, then do his hasted full attack routine (Initiative of like, +13), usually managing to his with another 2-3 attacks before even getting to his iterative attacks.

And, thanks! The red dragon should be a good start. You can always throw a dragon at the party. :D

~~

If anyone wants some setting information, the party is supposed to be attempting to stop a plot to unleash Rovagug on the world. Currently, they are in Andoran just as an a war between Cheliax and Andoran is breaking out, at the machinations of a oh, what are those not quite Archdevil guys, Dukes?

Also, they have almost no chance of spotting your +38 stealth rogue (while the CR 14 at least has a remote chance).

All dragons have 60' blindsense. If the rogue is withing 60' of the dragon, and has anything less then total cover (concealment would be useless), the dragon or dragons know exactly which square the rogue is in. (Blindsense needs line of effect to work.) They would still have the 50% miss chance if the dragon couldn't see the rogue, but the dragon would know the rogue was there.

Their breath weapon wouldn't care about the miss chance (no attack roll). IT might do no damage to the rogue himself (Evasion), but it could remove whatever the rogue is hiding behind.

Ah yes, I forgot that blindsense was universal. I thought they didn't get that until they were older.

The rogue usually would get a surprise round and get a hit off, then do his hasted full attack routine (Initiative of like, +13), usually managing to his with another 2-3 attacks before even getting to his iterative attacks.

If the rogue sticks around to full attack this dragon, the dragon should full attack him right back.

Dragon's Defense wrote:

AC 29, touch 8, flat-footed 29 (+21 natural, –2 size)

hp 212 (17d12+102)

He'll survive the full attack. Almost guaranteed. The rogue, however...

if the dragon can pre-buff, have it use true-strike, and then when it has a full-round action (or acts in surprise round and has good init) bite/grab the guy using the -20 option, and move away later leaving the rogue no longer threatening the dragon. definitely customize the spell-list, and perhaps feats for the dragon, keeping in mind encounter staging and action economy. and i think it's important to play enemies such that they will retreat before being defeated, the parties resources are down, maybe some party members are down, and they lost a real win. CR is meant for the party to win, or not be defeated, most of the time, but the enemy escaping is a valid encounter ending too. enemies with spells to make that happen is usually the best way, bar burrow or swim speeds. encounters in water, or in fog/smoke, or with earthglide/crystalsight are important too. enemies that can pre-cast deeper darkness on a weapon/item they subsequently draw for free (and see thru DD) is an action-efficient way to spring deeper darkness 'out of the blue'. hypnotic pattern/rainbow pattern are good AoE/multi-target-affecting Will-targeting effects.

Utilize terrain to your advantage. Put some traps on the battlefield. Send in a couple swarms to get up close and personal. Use illusions to have the rogue expose himself and full attack him after he attacks the illusion.

well, it's not that long of range of a spell, if the dragon is playing long range artillery of death games...
besides that, having ring of freedom of movement would help,
and it since they're only helpless but not paralyzed, their actions aren't that limited...
(actually, the intent is probably for them to be paralyzed also, since helpless itself doesn't limit actions - as is contrasted w/ entangled on the passed save)
still, given the explicit allowance of breathing, they can use a breathweapon to destroy the ice,
leaving them a move action to move somewhere (better action economy than the F-R strength check)
but mostly if there is effects like fog or smoke that will prevent targetting, as well as water/etc.

I would caution you against dragons. Played properly a dragon can be a surprisingly lethal foe. I would save dragons for a big boss fight. You have tons of options before resorting to pulling out the dragon card.

I was thinking as using it as the Boss of the arc for tomorrow (which we may or may not reach), with a highly visible but long range demonstration of its power at the beginning to set the plot rolling, and now I need some minions for it.

Possibly a weaker dragon for them to whet their teeth on, but I also need some other stuff.

If it has clear connections to Rovagug (who the dragon is working for), all the better, but fluff is mutable.

yeah, casting silence on the dragon itself is exactly what i imagined. terrain itself may prevent avenues for moving away, not to mention drawing AoOs from the dragon (with bite/grab). hit and run tactics / fly-by work best when it can be done so that terrain masks line-of-sight/effect (whether in and out of water/fog/etc, or with trees/rocks blocking the skyline, that sort of thing) of course dragons are usually BBEGs, but you expect to encounter those every level or 2 anyways. similar scenarios also work to the benefit of other enemies as well. also use multi-NPC encounters with class levels, something like an Evil Life Oracle with Energy Body is immune to so much stuff. Air elementals themselves are nasty, especially if buffed. Earth Elementals with earth glide is a pain too.

silence can be thru UMD, or a 1st level Cleric NPC ally of it, etc.
i would recommend mixing up the feat list, not necessarily with fly-by, but that's an option.
but the red dragon is just one encounter, while there's lots of different encounters that can provide more challenge.

...one of the craziest encounters i had was in a slumbering tsar game,
there was a recurrence of monsters with demonic templates, this one was some type of swarm that separated from another demonic monster, but the swarm was rather tough because it has both swarm immunities and all these energy immunities. my wizard could just cast fireballs hoping that minor damage would get thru Resist, while otherwise being useful with Dimension Door cast thru his Familiar, to get allies out of a pinch. I think an evil NPC with Channel Energy ended up taking it down.

The Red Dragon listed in the Bestiary is a suggestion, it is not how all red dragons are built. The Spell-like abilities do not change but the spells can and should change to suit the dragon.

Unfortunately, Silence is not part of the Sorcerer caster levels the Red Dragon gains. So you still need to supply Silence some other way. I suggest the Red Dragon Silences himself. A potion of Silence will do this. Silencing the Sorcerer wont work well anyhow since either the Sorcerer gets a save or he can move away from the source of the silence.

Finally, consider adding class levels to a dragon in order to beef it up without pushing it into another age category.

if the dragon has a familiar thru level of sorceror or feats (eld. heritage), that can be delivering pre-cast touch spells, as well as using it's own abilities. sucker's gonna have a ton of HP's too :-)

i like the dark creeper/slayer suggestion, or something like a 15th level sorceror (APL+3/4 at their current level) with raise the deep throwing down 30' deep of water wherever they want: if that's inside an area, that could well leave no air to breathe, so holding breath is mandatory (effective silence).

Red dragons have access to cleric spells in addition to sorcerer spells. No need for UMD, or an NPC cleric. (Though since the very young gdragons caster level is only 1, it does need to succeed at a DC 4 caster level check.)

Edit: Or at least that would of worked, had Pathfinder not removed that ability from red dragons, as well as as removing it from Blue, Brass, Bronze, and Copper dragons.

Be sure to enforce when the players can rest, any encounter at APL +3 past level 10 are not going to challenge a fresh party if it's the only encounter they face.

A party typically has enough resources to last through 4 encounters At PL before things start getting lethal, 5 encounters for 5 players, but you need to remember that the party can't rest more then once in a 24 hour period, that means they must wait a full 16 hours before they can rest again.

Design a number of at PL random encounters designed solely to be inserted where you need them to keep your players on the move.

As for your party, let them wreck face, that's why they made their characters that way if they're having fun with their characters then you shouldn't have to make encounters that trump your player's capabilities.

Remember that dragons have auras, the adult red dragon's aura is heat and will damage anyone within five feet, such as a grappled opponent. Dragons also have reach and their bite reach usually extends another five feet from their other natural attacks. Dragons are immune to sleep and paralysis effects. They also have damage resistance. Red dragons can see in smoke, so they like to cast "pyrotechnics" on the battleground.

In a full attack they get up to six attacks (bite, 2 claw, 2 wing, tail slap). The adult red dragon I linked can cast haste, which would give it another attack. It can also cast "dispel magic" which could take a key weapon out of the fight since they have DR (magic). Dragons also tend to be able to cast "alarm" so it is very hard to sneak up on one. A warned red dragon will likely quickly cast one or more of "haste", "shield", "invisibility" and "resist energy: cold" given time. A quick "pyrotechnics" upon seeing the intruders and casting pyrotechnics on a fire should not end the dragon's invisibility.

I have both fought dragons as a player, and set dragons on player groups as a GM. An adult red dragon is a fearsome beast. About the only thing your players will have going for them is the action economy. They will need to utilize that to their best effect.

yeah, but all that low level cross-class stuff can and should be taken care of thru scrolls, potions, or NPC underlings.
if it only has a given number of rounds to prepare, best to let NPC underlings do that so the dragon can use it's own spells at full caster level.

Thanks for the help guys! Should make for a fun boss fight! And, I'm not worried about the fight being too difficult, as they've got a powerful NPC in their debt (well, a default Lich, so not actually that strong), so I'm sure they could get some ressurect's if it's a TPK.

(Well, technically the lich can't do that, but they don't know I'm using a default lich's stats for him. Still, it'd make sense that a necromancer could raise the part from the dead. :P)

Yep don't let them know it's a dragon. Have him use minions. Use suggestion and perhaps add Charm Person to his spells. Enchantments (Charm, Suggestion etc.) will also work well to give you a link to the next BBEG after the dragon ... your devils (and their Duke).

They kinda negotiated a truce with the devils. They're no more interested in Rovagug being free on the planet than the angels are. So, as long as the party doesn't contest their assault on Andoran, they seem to have an accord.

Of course, I plan on the devils being a constant nuisance, even if they say that they're respecting the terms of the truce. :D

Adamantine Dragon, I have to disagree with your statement regarding not tweaking the red dragon. The level 12 party I GM would shred an Adult Red Dragon in no time even with me running it to its fullest. It sounds like the OPs group is built to do similar.

The fire aura is virtually nothing. The Frightful presence wouldnt even phase my group. It would take most of my group a 1 to fail a fear save. My group consists of a Paladin, Cleric, Wizard, Rogue. The Rogues will save vs fear is the worst at only a +15 if he is within 30' of the paladin. The rest need 1s and the paladin is immune.

Even without a Paladin in the group they will have 50/50 or so against red dragon fear.

The average AC for the party is about 33. The paladin can pump it up to a 37, 40 if Smiting the dragon. 43 if Fighting defensively. While a fighter would not have the smite the fighter would probably have a higher AC bonus to start with so it balances out.

My point is that some groups act at easily +2 CR even when they are balanced via WBL etc. If the OP feels that his group is hard to provide challenges for he may have to custom tailor encounters to do just that.

Solo monsters don't fare well against entire parties. The PCs get 4-5 rounds worth of actions total (1 per PC) for every round the dragon gets.

Using multiple weaker monsters (but not too weak) will probably make for a better, and more challenging, fight. (For instance, 2 young adult red dragons [CR 13 individual, combined CR 15], or a young adult and a juvenile [CR 11 and 13 individual, combined CR 14].

+1
i dont' think you need to change the actual stats/abilities of the dragon,
but mixing up feats and spells just makes it more interesting...
you wouldn't give every sorceror NPC the same feats/spells, why do so for dragons?
they aren't supposed to be mooks with identical hordes, each one is a unique villain/ally...

Add mooks. Mooks are always good for flattening out specialities. The rogue needs to get past them without killing them off (he'd be noticed). The sorcerer can clearly deal with them easily but they take up his time. They can't hurt the Aldori but can get in the way or hit him with spells. And they let the two also-rans contribute meaningfully to the fight.

To go with the dragon it could be something as feeble as fire-resistant kobolds (add traps to complicate the issue), or some salamanders. And you can't go wrong with mephits.

The problem with designing foes for this party is not that the party is super strong all around, but that it is incredibly focused in ways that make it hard for me to make an opponent that can survive their few good tricks, without obliterating the party.

Sorcerer has incredible firepower, but has invested very little in defense of any sort. Glass cannon to the max. Nearly got killed by four Crypt Things (CR 5) teleporting next to him, preventing him from AoE'ing his way out of things (as he doesn't have a chance in hell of surviving one of his own spells)

Rogue has very good offense and stealth, but has a +3 will save (yeah.... he didn't know about Cloaks of Resistance at the start)

The Aldori Swordlord/Monk is nigh invulnerable.. but that's all he is. He can't pump out that much DPS or even close with kiting opponent's usually.

A flame drake can, as a standard action, breathe a ball of flame that explodes like a fireball. This attack has a range of 180 feet and deals 5d6 points of fire damage (DC 20 Reflex half) to all creatures within a 20-foot-radius spread. Once a flame drake has used its fireball breath, it cannot do so again for 1d6 rounds. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Speed Surge (Ex)

Three times per day as a swift action, a flame drake may draw on its draconic heritage for a boost of strength and speed to take an additional move action in that round.

Regarding the CL 16th icy prison, the description of the spell says the target is helpless but can still breathe. While the straight DC 31 STR check might be a bit challenging, if the dragon can still breathe then it can use its breath weapon. 12d10 fire damage ought to completely slag that prison in a single go (the ice would have 48 hp total).

If you're going to use those drakes you posted, as a CR 8, you're going to want at least 4 of them to make things even remotely challenging for an APL 11-12 group. Maybe even 5 or 6. Or 4 of them combined with some spellcasters of some kind, maybe a couple of 8th-level wizards or sorcerers, particularly if one is devoted to counterspelling the party sorc.

Oh yeah, I was thinking about 4 of them, combined with like, 30 low level get 1-shotted mooks for fun and bloodshed.

For his fireball spell,
Dual Blooded dragon and that elemental variant for +2 damage per d6
Varisan Tattoo + Spell Specialization + Trait +1 CL + Trait -1 metamagic level + One of the buff-characters figured out a way to grant him another +2 bonus to CL, from like, morale bonus or something.

Empowered Intensified, that ends up as an average of 123.75 fire damage, at CL 18 for penetrating spell resistance.

Regarding the CL 16th icy prison, the description of the spell says the target is helpless but can still breathe. While the straight DC 31 STR check might be a bit challenging, if the dragon can still breathe then it can use its breath weapon. 12d10 fire damage ought to completely slag that prison in a single go (the ice would have 48 hp total).

right, and like i said, it's better action-economy-wise even if they can pass the STR check no problem. i'm certain the intent is also to make them paralyzed while still affected by the ice (actually impeding their actions, unlike helpless).

Make them blow their resources early on minions/traps/haunts/challenges. This really can't be stressed enough. No single CR encounter is going to challenge them if they go into it with full spells, abilities, and power. The more you wear them down with repeated encounters, the more challenging subsequent encounters will become.

Templates are also your friend. It lets you turn otherwise mundane lower CR creatures into something potentially terrifying and difficult to defeat.

Where do you anticipate the battle happening? If it happens where the dragon can exploit his flying and breath weapon, that will drive different tactics than if it happens in a cramped cave underground.

If it does happen in the dragon's lair, then there should be lots of nasty traps to deal with on top of the mooks, minions and dragon.

And don't underestimate the value of some well placed illusions against a +3 will save...